


Not Today

by pocky_slash



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-29
Updated: 2009-11-29
Packaged: 2017-11-04 11:56:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/393583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pocky_slash/pseuds/pocky_slash
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-"Exit Wounds." <i>"You know," Ianto says quietly, calmly, "this is going to destroy one of us."</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Not Today

**Author's Note:**

> No actual spoilers for CoE, but because I've pretty much repressed CoE as a whole, it didn't occur to me until after I was finished writing this how super ridiculously depressing it is, in light of CoE. So. Warning? Angst? Love and thanks to [](http://neurotictealeaf.livejournal.com/profile)[**neurotictealeaf**](http://neurotictealeaf.livejournal.com/), [](http://suchthefangirl.livejournal.com/profile)[**suchthefangirl**](http://suchthefangirl.livejournal.com/), and [](http://queenriley.livejournal.com/profile)[**queenriley**](http://queenriley.livejournal.com/) for the beta, reassurances, and laughing at the most ridic typo ever.

_And I say, "I am alone, that's all.  
You can't save me from all the wrong I've done."  
But they're waiting just the same,  
with their flashlights and their semaphores  
and I act like I have faith and like that faith never ends  
but I really just have friends._

 

"You know," Ianto says quietly, calmly, "this is going to destroy one of us."

They're sitting on the floor in the main part of the Hub, wiring together some sort of grenades made out of what might as well be tin cans and twist ties. Jack swears up and down that they'll work as long as Gwen and Ianto make them to his specifications. Then he vanishes into the depths of the Hub, coat swinging behind him, leaving them to piece together their last chance at salvation.

"Don't talk like that," Gwen says to Ianto, not looking up from the wire she's carefully winding into an empty beer can.

"I'm being practical," Ianto says. She spares him a glance, but his eyes are focused on the empty tin camping mug he's attaching a wire to. "Even if Jack goes into the antechamber, someone has to stay behind to make sure the box drops."

"We'll find a way, Ianto," Gwen says. "We always do."

"But one day we won't," he replies. His voice is still steady and she hates him a little bit for that, almost as much as she loves him with every breath in her body, almost as much as she's grateful that he's the one to bring this up. "One day, we're not going to have time to come up with the distraction, and when that day comes, I want you to know it's going to be me."

"No," Gwen says. She puts down her can, useless, now, what with her hands shaking like this. "Ianto, please, stop talking that way."

"It will be hard," Ianto continues. He picks up a soldering iron and connects the wires of the tin cup to an empty soda can. "Jack, especially, won't be able to accept it, so I need you to stay strong. I need you to convince him to rebuild. I need you to take care of him."

She has the presence of mind to wait until he's put the soldering iron down before she slaps him.

His eyes are wide, shocked, and so blue when he looks up at her. The way he moves his hand to his cheek is almost comical, especially when paired with the bright red hand print she can already see forming on his pale skin. She'd laugh if she wasn't so angry, so tied up in the knowledge that god, he's right, he's right.

"No!" she says. "No, you don't get to talk like that! Not right now! Not ever, Ianto Jones."

The pain of it, aside from the horror of imagining life without this brilliant man, imaging a world without the brother she's discovered in a wayward colleague, is that she understands him. She understands that this is a gift he's giving her. _I love you_ , he's saying. _You have a chance at a normal life. You have Rhys. And I want you to live._ Because Jack will always keep living, regardless of whether Ianto dies tomorrow or in two months or in twenty years, Jack is used to losing, and Jack and Torchwood are all that Ianto has.

"Bugger _Jack_ ," she says, torn between wanting to hit him again and wanting to wipe away the tears stinging the corners of her eyes. " _Jack_ won't be able to accept it? What about _me_?"

He licks his lips and she can see from the way he's resettling his shoulders that all is not right, that he's as close to losing it as she is.

"Gwen," he says, voice still even, "I've seen things... I've _done_ things, Gwen. Not just here. I was a part of Torchwood One. I played my small part in facilitating that disaster. I destroyed my own life, everything I'd built, and nearly the entire world in the aftermath."

"You've been forgiven that, Ianto," she says. "You've paid your penance a million times over. You've saved the world."

"You have too," he replies. "You've saved the world and you have a husband and parents and the chance to start a family. You have a life, Gwen, and you should get a chance to live it. This is my life now. And if I go out doing this, because of Torchwood...." He's quiet, suddenly, hands back to fumbling with the long line of wired cups and cans. "Then let that be my penance."

"You have more than that," Gwen insists. "You have a man who loves you so fiercely he'd go to the ends of the Earth to protect you. You have a niece and a nephew and a sister who would love you if you gave them a half a chance. And even without all of that, you have me and I can't--I _won't_."

"The day will come, Gwen," Ianto says, but his voice is soft now, almost scared. His expression isn't blank anymore, he's not looking at the ridiculous contraption on the floor. He's looking straight into her eyes and he's terrified.

"Not today," Gwen says. She doesn't know where the conviction comes from, where the knowledge that she can't lose Ianto, not _yet_ melds with this unequivocal certainty that's suddenly washing over her in waves. She holds his gaze, tries to radiate the certainty back to him, tries to loosen the fear haunting his expression, tries to show him that today is just another day, they'll get through it and they'll be able to face tomorrow. He looks as lost as she's ever seen him, like a little boy faced with the realization that he's on his own and there's no one there to catch him.

She reaches out, gently, and cradles his cheek, her thumb soothing the edge of the red mark she left there, her chilled fingers taking the sting out of his heated skin.

Wherever this faith has come from, she can see the moment that it transfers to him, as if relayed by touch. His expression twists and changes over the space of a heartbeat. She feels him break for a moment, just a moment that would have been nearly invisible to someone that wasn't her, wasn't Jack. A pained inhalation of air, a soft, wet, broken noise that's nearly silent, but almost seems to echo in the ensuing stillness.

Then he takes a deep breath, opens his eyes, and smiles at her. It's a worn out smile, a smile that's running on too much caffeine, on too little sleep, on too many days spent hovering right on the edge of disaster. But it's a smile, and a true one at that. He takes her hand delicately, like he's afraid of breaking her, and presses a dry kiss to her fingertips.

"Not today," he repeats.

Then Jack is back, his grin manic, his hands waving a long black box in the air, shouting, "I've got it, I've got it, put those down, I've figured it out!"

It's a rush of running and light and explosions and smoke, a blur of action that's unremarkable from any other blur of action because the three of them walk out of it alive and the world is safe for another day. Jack kisses her forehead and the corner of Ianto's mouth and leads them back to the Hub, talking a mile a minute, playing to the adrenaline still pumping through his body, leaving them to trail three steps behind.

Ianto reaches across the space between them and takes her hand.

 _Not today,_ the gesture says. And she clings to the knowledge, to the bone-deep faith that too much has happened at once, that if there's any good in the world, they'll live long enough for Ianto to find peace within himself, for Gwen to wring every ounce out of life. It's easy to hold onto it as the sun sets over the bay to the tune of Jack's monologue, as she feels Ianto's pulse steady and strong through their joined hands, but she's confident that if she loses it, she doesn't have to look any further than the man next to her in order to find it again. He's lost everything and he's still here, still breathing, and in a world where her life coalesces into a tight bubble around the three men she's tied to, that's all she needs to know to remember why she needs to keep going. That's all she needs to know to be able to remind him to do the same.


End file.
